Prepositions, such as at, around, by, after, along, for, from, of, on, to, with & without. (According to the Chicago Manual of Style, all prepositions should be uncapitalized in a title. NIVA and I recommend capitalizing prepositions 5+ letters long).

What’s the inciting event? (What event throws the main character out of his status quo/comfort zone?)

What’s the main character like? (Anything that makes him more interesting to prospective readers or suggests his role–please note that using the character’s name in the title does not necessarily accomplish either)

What’s the main antagonist like? (Same as for the protagonist)

What’s the setting like? (Time and/or place)

What’s the central goal of the main character and/or what’s at stake if he loses?

What’s the author’s style like?

Is there an interesting contrast between elements of the title?

If the title doesn’t nail at least three of these, I’d recommend rewriting it and/or starting over. Here are some examples that I enjoyed.

1. Be careful about needlessly long titles, particularly ones loaded with separate phrases. They’re typically less inviting to prospective readers and harder for people to remember. Unusually bizarre titles, like Saddam Hussein and the Hippies from Space, have more latitude here. (Regardless of length, they will be memorable).

2. If your title does not appeal to prospective readers, start over! Some words that rarely mean much to prospective readers include fictional character and place names. Alternately, some authors use puns. If the reader immediately makes prospective readers smile, fine. If readers will only understand the pun after reading the work, they won’t ever find out how witty the pun is… because they won’t open the book.

I named both my products (the writing advice website and the comic book series) Superhero Nation. I’d like readers to be able to Google one and not get confused with the other, so I’ll rename one. Probably the comic, because changing this website’s URL would break of all of our incoming links. Ick.

So now I’m just trying to come up with a placeholder title for a wacky office comedy about an accountant-turned-secret agent and his mutant alligator partner. At this late hour, these seemed remotely acceptable. What do you think?

THE TAXMAN MUST DIE

[alternate word: accountant]

GARY MUST DIE

(Normally, I think “Gary” is far too bland a name to be used in a title, but I like the contrast between the normal name and the extraordinary phrase).

Thanks for your e-mail, Giuseppe. Questor’s title failed to distinguish its premise. The setting is uncommon, but what happens in the book? What is the hero trying to accomplish in ancient Rome? Generally, the best titles identify the book’s premise.

His Majesty’s Dragon (“what if the war against Napoleon was fought with dragons?”)

Soon I Will Be Invincible: (“what if we told a superhero story mostly from the supervillain’s perspective?”)

Some other titles neglect the premise and focus on the subgenre and setting. That may be sufficient, but it’s generally not as impressive.

Superhero Nation. The title suggests it’s a superhero story set in the real world, but you’d have to look at the book cover to know that the book is mainly about an unlikely police officer and his non-human partner.

Questor. It’s a story set in ancient Rome, but that’s just the setting. What is the premise? What happens? What is the hero attempting to accomplish? My guess is that the setting isn’t interesting enough to sell the book on its own.

I wouldn’t recommend putting an animal in your title unless the animal actually features prominently in your book. No matter how obvious you think it is that Corporate Wolf is not actually about a Canis lupis, the red herring will throw off at least a few (and possibly many) of your readers. It would probably be worth your time to take out the animal name, particularly if your book will be on a shelf with fantasy or science fiction offerings.

Cadet Davis reviews and revises the titles of 30 manuscripts submitted to a writing workshop. This will help you evaluate and improve your titles.

Above Average

Houndsditch and the Age of Meat. Even though we don’t know who Houndsditch is, “the Age of Meat” slaps readers in the face. And it foreshadows how frighteningly funny the story is. Also, there’s meat involved.

Self Love. Definitely a head-scratcher, but an intriguing head-scratcher. However, it’s vague. Adding more details would probably benefit this story.

This article gives nine tips to writing a title that grips readers and sells your book.

1. Tell us enough about the book to make us want to read it.This is what separates bland, forgettable titles like The Dragon from classics like His Majesty’s Dragon. The more we can surmise about the plot, the better.

2. Do not use imaginary place names.Readers haven’t heard of Asgardia, Lukawanda, or whatever your fictional kingdom or city is called.Your invented words won’t interest us because they don’t mean anything to us.I think the place names most appealing to prospective readers are those that use English words, like the Temple of Doom. We can guess what a temple of doom is.Continue Reading »

Cadet Davis reviews and revises the titles of 30 manuscripts submitted to a writing workshop. This will help you evaluate and improve your titles.

Above Average

One Brown-Haired Girl With A Stick. This title slaps readers across the face and dares them to start reading.

A Labyrinth of Entrails. This story easily bests its horror competitors with comically gruesome imagery.

Moral Issues Aside. This has potential, but I think it would help to identify its genre and subgenre or add details about the plot. For example, “Moral Issues Aside, It’s Time For You to Die” or “Moral Issues Aside, Killing My Boss is a Bad Business Move.”

We’re up to 72 superhero movies since 2000 (current as of November 2017). You can download the full data here. Some observations: R movies are making up the quality gap with PG-13 movies. Superhero movies are improving. Over the last 5 years (2013-2017), the average superhero movie is averaging 70% on Rotten Tomatoes, up […]

Hey DeadPool, You are a funny guy. How did you become a super hero? What do you do when you’re not doing anything? Do you like being a superhero? Why do you wear a mask? Why do you wear red and white? Are you Canadian? Getting superpowers is sort of a long story. Some people […]

I feel like a marketing executive put a gun to the screenwriter’s head and said “I don’t CARE what the movie is about, put New York City, London, and Hong Kong in it. Just do that thing where the villain is trying to collect plot coupons around the world in places that happen to be […]

Den Warren, (K-Tron, Metahuman Wars) is issuing a call for 3k-5k word submissions for a superhero prose fiction anthology titled, The Supreme Archvillain Election. Each submission will be a supervillain sitting at a huge table explaining why they should be voted as the Supreme Archvillain, then they go into a story, etc. Reprint excerpts and […]

1. This movie is about as bad as Catwoman but, in Catwoman’s defense, it had okay action scenes. 2. Man of Steel particularly struggled with family dialogue. E.g. Clark’s Kryptonian parents take 3 minutes to describe their plan to send him to Earth and say their goodbyes. It’s pretty bland stuff, e.g. melodramatic intonations like […]

I spent 5 hours this week watching Man of Steel and taking 5,000 words of notes. It was like being trapped on an alien planet where the atmosphere consists 80% of characters telling Clark what incredible, grandiose things he symbolizes, 20% of daringly bad action scenes, 15% of grimly constipated expressions, and 15% of acting […]

Out of the Past is a 1947 noir thriller so brilliant I cannot do it justice. I would definitely recommend it, particularly if you’re working with… Characters Plots Accidental deaths falsely claimed as murder-suicides Double-crosses, triple-crosses, and maybe a quadruple-cross depending on how you interpret a self-defense kill with a fishing reel. A complex plot […]